Capacitive Touch Display 7" Parallel on Apalis iMX6

[anthonyabboud]

Hi Toradex Community,

I am currently working with the following hardware:

• Apalis iMX6Q V1.1D (Also tried with V1.1C and V1.1Y)
• Ixora Carrier Board V1.2
• Capacitive Touch Display 7" Parallel

I’ve been building Boot2Qt 5.15 images in the past and displaying GUI via HDMI port, no problem.

This time, I would like to build a prototype using the Capacitive Touch Display due to new layout requirements in this new device.

I figured I’d start with making Toradex Easy Installer work on the display. Initial plug without making changes from the First Steps with Capacitive Touch Display 7inch Parallel gives a poor quality 640x480 display instead of 800x480 display. The remaining fraction of the screen is black with colored stripes.

Then I started looking into changing that vidargs environment variable to

fw_setenv vidargs 'video=mxcfb0:dev=lcd,FusionF07A,if=RGB24 video=mxcfb1:off video=mxcfb2:off video=mxcfb3:off fbmem=32M'

but that’s didn’t seem to have done anything different.

So I started looking into enabling/disabling the Device Tree overlays provided by toradex on TEZI as indicated in the documentation online. So far, everything is pointing to the following .dtbo to enable:

However, I have not found a .dtbo named like this anywhere (is this outdated? If so, what am I looking for now?).
I’ve noticed so far the following:

1. TEZI 5.3.0: This version displays as 640x480. The overlays.txt shows:

fdt_overlays=apalis-imx6_parallel-rgb_overlay.dtbo display-edt7_overlay.dtbo apalis-imx6_stmpe-ts_overlay.dtbo apalis-imx6_hdmi_overlay.dtbo

No apalis-imx6_panel-cap-touch-7inch_overlay.dtbo is seen here.

2. TEZI 6.7.0: This version does not display at all. The overlays.txt shows:

fdt_overlays=apalis-imx6_vga-640x480_overlay.dtbo apalis-imx6_hdmi_overlay.dtbo

Again, no apalis-imx6_panel-cap-touch-7inch_overlay.dtbo is seen here.

3. Building my own Boot2Qt 5.15.17 via Yocto
   Checking the overlays available in the boot partition, like instructed in the online documentation, does not show apalis-imx6_panel-cap-touch-7inch_overlay.dtbo. I only see these instead:
   
   

So I’m assuming things got renamed throughout versions, I’m just unsure if I’m trying to do the right thing, and if so what exactly am I looking for now. I’d like to know how to solve this for Boot2Qt 5.15 as a starting point.

Is modifying the vidargs needed? Since I’m only using Toradex provided products, I should only expect to enable/disable overlays, and not create/modify some, right? Does all this even apply for TEZI?

Thank you in advance,
Anthony

[ToradexAI]

Hi, I’m the Toradex AI Assistant. The Toradex Support team will follow up with you shortly!

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Hi Anthony,

It looks like you’re on the right track but might be missing some key details. Let’s break down the steps to get your Capacitive Touch Display 7" Parallel working with the Apalis iMX6 and Ixora Carrier Board.

1. Device Tree Overlays

The device tree overlays are crucial for configuring the display correctly. It seems like you are not finding the specific overlay for the capacitive touch display. The overlays might have been renamed or updated in newer versions. Here are some steps to help you:

1. Check the Latest Overlays: Ensure you have the latest overlays from the Toradex Device Tree Overlays repository on GitHub. Sometimes, the names and configurations change with updates.

2. Identify the Correct Overlay: For the Capacitive Touch Display 7" Parallel, you might need to use a combination of overlays. Based on your description, you should look for overlays related to parallel RGB displays and touch controllers. For example:

   • apalis-imx6_parallel-rgb_overlay.dtbo
   • display-edt7_overlay.dtbo (or a similar one for the specific display)
   • apalis-imx6_stmpe-ts_overlay.dtbo (for the touch controller)

2. Modifying vidargs

The vidargs environment variable is used to set the video mode. Your current setting seems correct, but ensure that the display timings match the specifications of your 7" display. Here’s a refined example:

fw_setenv vidargs 'video=mxcfb0:dev=lcd,FusionF07A,if=RGB24,bpp=32 video=mxcfb1:off video=mxcfb2:off video=mxcfb3:off fbmem=32M'

3. Toradex Easy Installer (TEZI)

For TEZI, you need to ensure that the correct overlays are enabled. If the overlays are not present, you might need to add them manually. Here’s how you can do it:

1. Edit overlays.txt: Add the necessary overlays to the overlays.txt file in the boot partition. For example:

fdt_overlays=apalis-imx6_parallel-rgb_overlay.dtbo display-edt7_overlay.dtbo apalis-imx6_stmpe-ts_overlay.dtbo

2. Update TEZI: If the overlays are not included in the TEZI image, you might need to build a custom TEZI image with the required overlays.

4. Boot2Qt

For Boot2Qt, ensure that the device tree overlays are correctly applied. You might need to modify the Yocto build configuration to include the necessary overlays. Check the local.conf or bblayers.conf to ensure the overlays are included.

Summary

• Ensure you have the latest device tree overlays from the Toradex repository.
• Modify vidargs to match the display specifications.
• Edit overlays.txt in the TEZI boot partition to include the necessary overlays.
• Check your Yocto build configuration to ensure the overlays are included for Boot2Qt.

If you continue to face issues, please provide the exact error messages or behavior you observe, and we can further troubleshoot from there.

Best regards,
[Your Name]

Please, also check if these links can help you solve your problem:

Problems to display the Toradex Easy Installer

Hello everyone ! I’m currently working with the SoM Verdin iMX8M Plus on the Verdin Development Board. My goal is to flash in ROM a prebuilt image and to test the TSN features of the board. My first question is : do you have a pre-built image supporting the TSN ? For instance I chose this one : https://artifacts.toradex.com/artifactory/torizoncore-oe-prod-frankfurt/dunfell-5.x.y/release/13/verdin-imx8mp/torizon/torizon-core-docker/oedeploy/torizon-core-docker-verdin-imx8mp-Tezi_5.6.0+build.13.…

Device Tree Overlays (Linux) | Toradex Developer Center

Problem with 10.1" capacitive touch and Apalis iMX6 on Ixora v1.1.

[alex.tx]

If you simply need to modify Toradex Easy Installer so it is displayed full screen on your 7" display, you can refer to How to Modify a Toradex Easy Installer Image | Toradex Developer Center

But please be aware that you do not need to have Toradex Easy Installer to be shown in a display to use it:

• You can use it from your own computer via VNC: Flash a New Image Using Toradex Easy Installer | Toradex Developer Center
• You can use the autoinstall feature to flash images automatically and unattended: Production Programming for Linux | Toradex Developer Center

As for Boot2QT or other builds, please note that the apalis-imx6_panel-cap-touch-7inch_overlay.dtbo is available starting from version 6.0.0.

So, if you build or load one of the prebuilt images with a version number 6.x.x , you should have it available.

# ls /boot/overlays
apalis-imx6_adv7280_overlay.dtbo apalis-imx6_panel-cap-touch-10inch_overlay.dtbo apalis-imx6_spi1_spidev_overlay.dtbo
apalis-imx6_hdmi_overlay.dtbo apalis-imx6_panel-cap-touch-7inch_overlay.dtbo apalis-imx6_spi2_spidev_overlay.dtbo
apalis-imx6_nau8822-btl_overlay.dtbo apalis-imx6_panel-edt-5.7inch_overlay.dtbo apalis-imx6_tc358743_overlay.dtbo
apalis-imx6_ov5640-v11a_overlay.dtbo apalis-imx6_panel-edt-7inch_overlay.dtbo apalis-imx6_vga-640x480_overlay.dtbo
apalis-imx6_ov5640_overlay.dtbo apalis-imx6_panel-res-touch-7inch_overlay.dtbo

[alex.tx]

Hi @anthonyabboud ,

Have you been able to install the proper overlay and get your display to work?

[anthonyabboud]

Hi @alex.tx

I have not been able to make this work with Boot2Qt 5.15; we need to remain in that version due to some constraints.

Since we are now moving the prototype to commercial design, we have opted for a different solution, using an HDMI connected screen available for commercial use instead of evaluation only.

Thanks.
Anthony